


Miscellaneous Tumblr Prompts: A Series

by asemic



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Alcohol, Awkward Kissing, Desire, Drunk Sex, Frottage, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Manipulation, Masturbation, Minor Character Death, Religious Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-13
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-21 19:11:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14921231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asemic/pseuds/asemic
Summary: A (hopefully) growing collection of answered Tumblr prompts.





	1. Chapter 1

**Hickey/Irving | Anon's Prompt: carnivale night, Irving is drunk and Cornelius finally succeeds in his seduction.**

“Your costume is appropriate.”

His voice caught the Lieutenant off-guard, snapped the dulled aspect of his brain that dealt with choice to attention. _Shall I remain balanced or speak?_ Cornelius smiled when John Irving, the pure angel with enough spirits on his breath to expel fire picked the latter.

“Thank you,” Irving replied with eyes half-closed. He bounced against the table and raised his re-purposed tin can cup. “It’s empty.”

“That is a shame, sir. Let’s refill it, then.” Cornelius reached for the mug and Irving curled it closer to his body protectively. “Come now, next drink is on me,” he cooed lightly.

The angel wrapped in rough cord nodded and swayed slightly leading Cornelius to catch him. “I believe I fell.”

“Not at all, sir. You’ve encountered a sudden stop.” Cornelius grinned and tried convey good humor. If he had fangs he’d lick them and tear into Irving’s flesh. But he was only a man, not a beast. He held him steady. “See now, your wings keep you aloft.”

“To soar to heaven,” Irving muttered, his body sinking against Cornelius as a dead weight. “You’ll join me, Mr. Hickey.”

How kind to be included in his flight of fancy. “Only if you carry me there. Are your wings strong?”

He guided him through a maze of tables to the stands of alcohol. Carefully he steadied Irving’s hand under the tap and let it flow. “That’s quite the amount,” Irving laughed, not shying when Cornelius guided it to his lips. Some dribbled down his chin and he looked disappointed at the spill. “You should drink. This is time for celebration.”

“I have been, sir.” He reached for the cup and swallowed. “You witnessed that.”

“My wings are strong,” Irving leaned forward with flushed cheeks, nearly all restraint removed. Typically, the man had a rod up his ass that bent at the shoulders. The alcohol applied heat and warmed him, rendered him pliable. “We should sit.”

“I agree. I’ll lead and you walk, hm?” What a fucking scene they were, he in his top hat leading a man of God criss-crossed in rope to keep his wings attached. Stumbling in the snow to reach a bench hidden by a tent in the middle of a frozen hellscape. Cornelius’s body shook with silent laughter and he squeezed his hand tighter around Irving’s to keep him steady. “You still have your drink, sir?”

“I have, but yours disappeared.” Irving collapsed onto the bench, his face painted with concern for Cornelius’s plight. “Will we share? Let us share.”

He looked a state, his wings not fluttering, but bouncing with every sway. Eyes still lidded, mouth a soft curve, his mug outstretched. Christian pleasures, indeed. His halo comically tilted to the left and Cornelius adjusted the wire ring. He sat beside him. “Better. Now you are a proper angel with strength to haul me to my eternal rest.”

“I would. I would take you.” John _only John here, no longer a Lieutenant when separated from the others and his dignity_ sat forward, his arms propped against his thighs. “I will bear your weight. Allow me to guide you, Mr. Hickey.”

As if he could carry anything in this condition, let alone Cornelius’s soul. Like the past few minutes of being held up and guided bodily across the ice did not help him. The very man who deemed him dirty for his natural inclinations kept him in esteem enough to lead up upwards. Cornelius knew from an early age Heaven held no place for him. Only the mortal coil mattered. “I will.”

“Have you lost your horns, then, being so receptive to me? Are you no longer a devil in the shape of a man?” John removed the top hat and tilted Cornelius’s head for examination. He massaged along the crown of his head, searching for bumps that did not exist. In another place he’d deck the man and cut his purse, leave him in some alley where two-legged dogs feasted on vulnerability. Tonight, however, was a night of celebration. One last happy moment before they were buggered with vigor by command.

Twisting his face into a smile, Cornelius decided he might as well enjoy his time too. He considered his angle of attack and launched his volley. “Lucifer was an angel as well. The Light Bearer. Perhaps I am falling still, horns not yet grown, my wings on fire. I’m awaiting you to glide down and prevent my crash.”

John sighed wearily and ended his search. He propped his chin against Cornelius’s shoulder, his breath comfortably hot against his jaw. “I see my duty then.”

“An important task for you to undertake.” Cornelius swiped his pinky finger gently along the man’s hand. Seeing no sign of discontent he rested it against the rounded bone of his wrist then continued a path up his sleeve. His movements were slow as if done to gain the trust of a cur. John leaned closer, perhaps touch starved to succumb to Cornelius’s practices or his inclination to climb with his fellow men indicative of a deeper self. No matter the reason, Cornelius was there.

“My wings are stiff and willing.” John removed his halo and rubbed his cheek along Cornelius’s shoulder. A glance down confirmed the man’s statement. He defied his bearing when drunk, his cock a plump feature of his physical topography. John spread his thighs and his breath caught slightly when he found the action pleasing.

“Then, Raphael, we must embrace and bear your staff in hand together.” Cornelius leaned back onto the bench and John followed, splayed above him with his silly wings catching the lanterns’ light. Here was no angel, only a man with rosy cheeks and bitten lips, eyes wide and focused solely on growing pleasure. Cornelius felt him adjust his hips and _there_ John’s cock pressed insistent. “Shall I free you?”

“No.” Cornelius was taken aback and near expected him to find his bearings and leave. Instead, John reached between them with fingers oddly deft for a man who swayed and stumbled. He freed them from their pants. A pleasing turn of events, especially when John gasped as their pricks touched. It was a strangled sound like the sensation was foreign and long imagined. Cornelius wouldn’t be surprised if the man was a virgin. John existed these many years with hands clasped in prayer to forget his needs. Better to gorge and indulge; they will have time to make their penance.

He accepted the eager press of his mouth. John barely knew how to kiss, his movements an awkward mash of twisting lips and a thrusting tongue. It confirmed his assumptions, the man as inexperienced as a maiden. Cornelius tilted his head away. “Slow and I shall teach you the proper technique.”

Using gentle licks he rendered John’s mouth pliable, a careful pressure he increased until he lapped the alcohol from John’s tongue. He pulled away and drew a sad little noise from his companion. “Shhh. We must introduce another action,” he stated, hips rolling up and against. John’s body followed in kind, his movement an instinct all men held. To thrust, to plug, to hold the seed deep within the womb of a woman; to spread it onto the skin of a man, let it flow down his throat and leak along his thighs.

The kiss grew eager from Cornelius’s end, his desire to pull this man down to earth overriding the fine control he practiced. If John was drunk on alcohol then Cornelius on the power that came from driving this moment. He disrupted his ascent to Heaven. _Bugger your wings and the prayers that drop you to your fucking knees._ John moved his mouth to Cornelius’s cheek and painted his skin with long stripes of his tongue, filthy sounds carrying to his ear.

Smiling, Cornelius urged John to frot against him by digging his fingers into his hips. John cock was thick, a pleasant girth that Cornelius wished to stretch around. To watch bob and move when he eventually placed John on his hands and knees.

John paused his motion and wrapped his arms around Cornelius’s upper body, lifting and cradling him close. The man looked at him with a softness he rarely saw from anyone he fucked. With a soft press of lips to his forehead, John resumed his movements. The gentleness John held gradually became replaced by the rut of a man who needed his release. Though John wore the wings, Cornelius was the gift from above. He alone led them to the proper Heaven made of Flesh and Pleasure. Their bodies tensed and cocks pulsed, painted the true Holy Spirit across their skin.

“Thank you, sir, for carrying my weight.” Cornelius let the man untangle himself. John looked satiated while he tucked himself into his pants, his eyes focused on Cornelius’s softening genitals with curiosity. He never had a chance to observe him erect and weighty, a missed opportunity to be sure. Slowly, John extended a fingertip and traced a line along the length, eliciting a hiss. Cradled his balls lightly with a crooked, wondering smile.

John reached for his bent halo and tightened the ropes around his torso. He grasped his tin in hand and took a sip, his face flushed scarlet. His lips melted into a shy grin and he nodded to Cornelius. He bounded from the tent with a flare of energy and left Cornelius alone to wait for Carnivale’s end.


	2. i need a new approach | irving/hickey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Irving/Hickey | Anon’s prompt: You've got me nervous to speak / So I just won't say anything at all / I've got an urge to release / And you keep tellin' me to hold on / You've got me nervous to move / So I just won't give anything to you.**

The man knew. He must have heard him, the little noises he did not bite back surely transmuted into a solid state, carving syllables into the boards above Hickey’s hammock. Perhaps he smelled it on him. John washed until the water became cold and his skin raw under the flannel. Until he felt clean.

He offered the man a chance for redemption, to avoid being fed into their system of laws and reduced to a sentence and punishment. Yet, who will save John Irving? Who shall gather him in kind and lead him away from this temptation?

At times he found Hickey attempting to hold his gaze. It felt like a bore into his forehead, an awl piercing the back of his skull. And John relented and returned the stare with the same intensity. Hickey’s head tilted as if John was slipping from the even line of the earth and he alone righted him. Maybe he could peel John’s scalp like fruit and peer into his skull, read the matter like a book. Silently, through those piercing looks, Hickey entered his thoughts and saw only himself reflected in a hall of mirrors in various stages of undress and positions. 

Still, John took precautions when he grasped himself in hand. He balled up a handkerchief and bit down. This had to muffle him completely, to keep those sounds away from Hickey’s waiting ears. In his mind he tried to create shapes and shades without recognizable features. Soft breasts became a flat plane with two incisor-like birthmarks bitten above his heart. Dark curls cradling a cock spun gold. And Cornelius Hickey emerged fully formed, wanting. Waiting. 

Willing. 

He spat his cries into the wet cotton, his teeth digging holes between the threads. No one could hear, his emissions did not paint Hickey’s name across his belly or fingers. Not after he washed and scrubbed and willed his name from mind.

But still he knew. He held his focus on John, always searching and John relented. God help him, he did and he would. If Hickey whispered in his ear

_say yes_

John would.

How did he know? It was written on his body then, his initial denials to that incorrect. His needs, his desires were tattooed along his skin. He stripped in his room and angled the mirror to find where it hid. He bit back his frustration when he dragged his hand through his pubic hair as if the ghost of Hickey’s fingers were there to grip him. To raise his prick from its soft slumber.  
Nothing, only body hair and birthmarks. He sank into bed and drew the blankets over his nude form. John traced feather light lines along his hips and begged sleep to deliver him some understanding.

None came.

Often he stared at Hickey and tried to hold his attention. John tilted his head to see the man from a new perspective, let his stare turn birdlike. There were moments where he desired to abuse his rank and keep the man to his side. Then John could tell Hickey if he whispered

_say yes_

John would.

He’d deal with the loathing after, be a penitent for the rest of his life, don the hairshirt or self-flagellate to have a moment with Cornelius Hickey. What would they do during John’s madness? Explore. He wanted to witness the rise of Hickey’s prick, to coax him into hardness while marveling over the ingenuity of their bodies. He imagined taking advantage of Hickey’s experience and falling off the cliff. The landing unavoidable, but the sensation of flight made it worth the pain.

To submit pushed against his nature. To not turn to God during these moments betrayed his sense of being. But John _ached._ He longed and needed, physically required the man’s touch to quell his thoughts. John hid it, but still Hickey knew. Then it was a signal, his desire not scented nor heard, but a silent extension emanating from his pores. Tentacles crossed rooms and hierarchical spaces until they vibrated near Hickey, electric.

They stood close at one point, John observing the quality of his work. He extended his need to him, cast the invisible net, and complimented his caulking technique. Their hands brushed and a jolt of lightning sparked between them.

John caught Hickey’s eyes and opened his mouth. His lips moved, but no sound escaped. He tasted cotton. Hickey stood patiently, waiting. His eyes whispered

_say yes_

and John turned, his cowardice bent him at the shoulders and leaked from his skin.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
> **Irving/Hickey | Anon's prompt: Some kind of hurt/comfort prompt for Hickey/Irving: AU where Gibson is killed by Tuunbaq a few weeks after he and Hickey were caught by Irving. Irving feels sorry for Hickey and wrestles with the urge to comfort him.**  
> 

There wasn’t much of William Gibson left to bury. To stand on the ice at one moment and be reduced to a smear in another chilled John far more than the biting air. Hickey alone cared for his body, his voice a harsh whisper of rebuke when others approached. He wrapped his remains and hauled him to the dead room, stumbling down the stairs. John provided the light and a moment of privacy when he lowered him beside the rest. A small, neat package to be nibbled by rats. 

“I am sorry.” John secured the room and ignored the return of the dreadful sound of scurrying immediately filling the area. “No man should.” He stumbled over what he could say, the usual words of comfort that comes with assisting another with loss didn’t fit here. He fell silent and kept his attention on Hickey’s boots. A congealed spot of blood on the toe; John felt ill. 

Hickey’s voice choked with emotions. “You feel sorry? I am shocked you can hold feeling for a man with a wolf’s ear.” His jaw was set and his eyes large wet mirrors. John mentally chided the man for speaking so freely, but did not dare say anything. “Am I dismissed? I do not wish to hear the rats feast on Billy’s flesh.” 

John nodded and swept his arm out. Hickey ascended up the stairs and out of sight. 

*

The man looked like a ghost. He simultaneously bore his loss bodily and locked himself away. Red-rimmed eyes stood stark against his pale skin, his walk hunched. But he did not speak of Mr. Gibson. He did not speak at all in fact, except a brief “yes, sir” to acknowledge an order.

John did not expect the loss to overshadow him completely, to render Hickey a shell of who he once was. But he must not have understood him as completely as he thought. Hickey held a depth of feelings that stretched beyond his cunning. He cared for another though the reasons improper. 

In all honesty John did not know how to continue. He alone understood the truth of their relationship though he tried to forget. The hushed sounds, how they shuffled their clothing into suitable form. It was a punishable act, yet he provided mercy and remained silent. Now Hickey bore the weight of his grief alone. 

He considered doing nothing and leaving Hickey be. His work did not suffer and he became tempered; he achieved John’s goal. It only took the loss of man to do so. John felt the cruelty of this notion and rubbed his thumb against his forefinger. A nervous habit he thought he shook long ago returned in force thanks to Hickey. 

But to reach out further may lead to Hickey shying away. Retreating deeper into his sadness and loneliness, those thoughts may push him to something drastic. John saw too many outcomes, Hickey being a man who defied his expectations. Perhaps he’d be receptive to one final gesture of support. John would see how he was, express his sympathy, and leave. 

He found him sitting alone on a box, the same space where John discovered his actions with Gibson. A cigarette sat unlit and balanced on his lip, match held to be struck, but frozen in place. As if his mind took him away for the moment and kept him from completing his motions. He considered leaving him be, but his feet moved him forward. 

“Would you prefer to be alone?” 

Hickey jumped slightly and he glared at John before settling his face in a more neutral expression. He tucked the cigarette and match in his pocket and stood to attention. “I would, but I do not own this shared space.” 

John took an additional step forward, but maintained enough distance to be respectful. “How are you doing?”

“I have suffered a loss, sir. There is nothing left to be said.” Hickey’s mouth stretched into a wan smile, his face hollow. “Would you prefer if I tore at my clothing and wept?”

“I would not. We all mourn in our own way. It is merely Christian to reach out during trying times.” John paused. “It is human.” Hickey’s eyes turned hard and he glanced to his side, doubting John’s compassion. “You push back at my attempt to sympathize. From what I’ve observed, no other man has offered anything beyond the initial kindness to help prepare his remains.”

Hickey made an indignant noise and shook his head. “Do not weaponize your kindness to wield it against me during a time of vulnerability.” 

“Why must our conversations take turns?” John’s frustration bubbled like bile and threatened to burst across his words. He bit back his tone as best as he could, his fist tight. 

“Maybe it’s the judgement you’ve held over my head when you discovered us that colors the tone.” Hickey’s face lost its waxen quality, his cheeks flushed; either with anger or from remembering those moments he and Gibson shared. John stood a bit taller and pushed their acts from mind. “Sodomites. I am and he was. Undeserving of much and denied the rest, Lieutenant.” 

Hickey sat down and brought his hands to his face, scrubbed at his cheeks. “What joys do we have on this ship? We work, we pray for the ice to dislodge us, and wait to die.”

At the claws of a creature, John finished. He swallowed thickly. “The company of others. You take solace in your fellow man, in the correct manner. Not as you did.” 

“Judgement passed, the whip spared, but punishment still received.” Hickey made a fist and hit his thigh. “Billy is gone. The spark of hope is lost and I am as decidedly dead as he.” He chuckled and shook his head, sniffed. “You are terrible at providing comfort, sir.” 

John agreed. He should have followed his initial instinct and not come. “I apologize for making it worse.”

“You were correct that no one else tried. You did out of concern.” 

“Have you no one else to turn to in friendship?” 

“No.” The answer came simply and quickly. “Have you? I imagine you eat with others, but do your conversations have meaning?”

“Of course.” Hickey simply folded his hands in his lap and his lips curled into a knowing smile. Even through his grief, Cornelius Hickey held the ability to see through his walls. Still, he kept them built up. “You assume much about me.” 

“And you me.” Hickey looked introspective. “How can we be lonely within the crowded confines of a wooden beast?”

This was a proper opening then. To be there for Hickey. He crossed the threshold separating them and sat on the box beside him. For a moment they would be equals in this conversation. “We share so much. It makes sense to want to hold something, even ourselves, back.”

They sat in a pregnant silence for a moment, a beat too long for John who did not thrive in the uncomfortable. “For a moment I had Mr. Gibson.” John turned and looked at Hickey, his face composed, but despair fluttered off him. Sails in a gentle breeze. “Emotional restraint, sir, is not my strong suit. It is the noose around my neck. Yours is the opposite, Lieutenant.”

John knew. He did not like hearing it from a man of lesser rank, but he’d stay silent as they unlocked the shackles of Hickey’s grief. “I prefer it. Temper the flames.” His ears grew hot under the intensity of Hickey’s stare. 

“And what happens if you don’t keep the fires low?” Hickey had a way of making the most innocent statements sound wicked. 

“I do not let myself reach such a state.” John sat a bit straight, observed the relaxing line of Hickey’s body. “You ought to learn from my example.”

“I am learning.” Hickey did not slink or shift his features into wickedness, stare at John as if he were meat. Instead he smiled warmly. “I will need to rely on you since I have no one.”

“In what manner?” He breathed the words out with far more emotion than he desired. John cleared his throat and wished he could reel them back, past his lips and swallow them into his belly. “Undoubtedly prayer and praise. Companionship” He stammered as Hickey pursed his lips and quirked his brow.

“Undoubtedly. In the correct way.” Hickey spoke as if he were searching, each words spaced with a pause. A question. It returned John’s thoughts to when he found the late Mr. Gibson with the man. John began to rub his fingers together, a movement Hickey’s eyes witnessed. He always felt self-conscious near Hickey, as if he alone knew who John truly was even more than John himself. 

“When you and Mr. Gibson,” John stopped himself, unsure if he ought to continue. His mind already opened, the fabric of his resolve unspooling from a single picked thread. “Were you two friends before you assumed your interactions or was it performed with immediacy?” Is that what sodomites did? Fall their eyes upon one another and rut like creatures barely secluded? 

Hickey expelled his breath in a chuckle. “We spoke prior. Why, I even asked his name before we had one another behind these very boxes.” John shifted, his stomach rolling as if he felt a sudden drop. Did Hickey use Gibson’s name during? All he heard were steady, shaky sounds and John’s face grew hot when he tried to discern Hickey’s noises from memory. 

A sniff broke him from his distraction. Hickey’s face was open and soft, large tears spilling down his cheeks. “He wanted to live somewhere warm, sir. Do you think after we find the Passage we’ll go to someplace like that?” 

John placed a hesitant hand on Hickey’s shoulder and let the man lace their fingers together. He squeezed tight and John felt no disgust. Only the very urgent need to embrace him in the warmth William Gibson was denied, trapped in the cold, cruel bowels of the dead room. “We will, Mr. Hickey. I promise, we will feel summer once again.” 

Hickey’s smiled wistfully and sunlight washed over John, a heat like a smoldering fire sparked bright.


End file.
